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The Breaking Bad Characters Guide to Life

It’s finally here. The final season of Breaking Bad. The journey is almost complete. Remember when Walt still had cancer? Remember when he was still a decent human being? God, we were so young.

No matter how it ends, when Breaking Bad is over we are all going to be left with a pathetic feeling of emptiness. Some of the most compelling characters in television will depart from our lives, likely forever.

But before you start mourning their loss you should know that every Breaking Bad character is microcosm of all of our personalities. They are just derived from how we behave in certain circumstances. No one has the same personality as Walt, but everybody acts like Walt at one time or another.

Below is a guide (for your convenience) that will help you realize when you are behaving most like each character:

Hank Schrader:

–When someone tries to cut in front of you in a long line. There is nothing more infuriating than waiting in line, but we all do it because it represents the most basic elements of being a civilized person. If we can’t respect the sanctity of the line then where will it end? The stock market could fail, the government could burn to the ground. It all starts with our ability to wait in line while pretending we have more important things to do.

But when someone clearly cuts in front of you (and others) in line, you become an enforcer of proper etiquette, determined to bring justice to the entire line. It doesn’t matter if the perpetrator is your own flesh and blood, you will become uncharacteristically loud, crass and inappropriate while trying to retain order to the line.

You might not realize it, but this is the exact look on your face when you see someone cutting a line in the distance:

Walt Jr. (Flynn):

When you’re eating breakfast. I’m certainly not the first person to point this out, but Walt Jr. LOVES his breakfast. And who can blame him? Breakfast is amazing. The guy’s dad is an obsessive drug lord and his mom is a depressed money launderer. The tension in the household is painful to watch, but as long as Walt Jr. is going to town on a Spanish Omelet he’s totally clueless. Think back to this morning when you were eating breakfast. Was someone talking to you? No? Are you sure? Or did you just completely zone out your surroundings like Flynn?

Saul Goodman:

When you talk your way out of any type of ticket. I’m not saying that you were like Saul when you actually got out of the ticket, I’m saying that you will think that you were just like Saul immediately after getting out of the ticket and will continue to act as such for the rest of the day. Once I went to court to refute a metro ticket and I got the charge dropped. Breaking Bad had not premiered by then, but if it had, I would have almost certainly been sporting an oddly-colored shirt and tie combo the next day.

Skyler White:

When you are the only sober person in a group of people trying to have fun. Drunk people always have a lot of ideas. Ninety percent of those ideas are terribly irresponsible. As the only sober person, you will see the risk involved in these drunken plans and you will try to talk the rest of the group out of the idea instead of just going with the flow. There’s something that you should probably know for whenever you are playing the role of Skyler: EVERYBODY HATES YOU.

Jesse Pinkman:

-When someone cuts you off in traffic. When someone cuts you off on the freeway you are guaranteed to instantly start talking like Jesse. You won’t pull it off like Jesse does, you’ll sound ridiculous.

–Also, when non smokers smoke a cigarette. I know this, I’m not a smoker, but when I smoke a cigarette I do so extremely dramatically and make an exhaling motion as if my life is more stressful than anyone can understand. If the non-smoker is on a futon they will also lean back and close their eyes after inhaling as if they’re doing heroin. Jesse smokes this way because he is thinking about being murdered by a fellow meth dealer. You will smoke this way because the Wi-fi password isn’t working.

Marie Schrader:

-When you’re being a pain in the ass.

Mike Ermantraut:

–When someone tries to spoil an episode of Breaking Bad that you haven’t seen yet. In all likelihood, you will threaten this person. For the first few seconds you will be very calm and you will let them know that if they so much as tell you what Walt Jr. had for breakfast then it will be the worst mistake they’ve ever made.

Gus Fring:

-That time when you were a kid when you played the game RollerCoaster Tycoon and for like five minutes you had the whole theme park under control. Inevitably all hell broke loose and little people were puking and throwing tantrums all over the place. But before shit hit the fan, you had a frightening sense of satisfaction that bordered on a God-complex.

Walter White:

–When you’re on Twitter. I know, you think Twitter is your way of showing off how witty your commentary on society is. But in reality, it probably makes you a terrible person. You get into the Twitter game with good intentions and simple motivations. Maybe you want to interact with your friends or have a small connection with your favorite celebrities.

But in time, it consumes your life. When Walt tells Jesse the meth business is “all he has left” that’s basically you talking about Twitter after you’ve refreshed it for the 10th time in two minutes. Your tweets stop being funny and are just mean hearted. You’re just criticizing every other person on Twitter. Your friends and loved ones stop being important to you. You develop an alter ego that makes you more confident to say mean things to people on the internet.

At some point, someone very close to you asks you to get off Twitter and go outside. This is your response:

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Now you know. Be cautious when in these situations so that you don’t become a full-fledged Breaking Bad character. No one wants that. Also, follow me on Twitter @JonathanAuping